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Missing in action: There wasno mention of reforms to the transparency register or of a mooted EU-wide whistleblowers directive. However, a Commission official said they could be included in the Commission’s work program for 2018, to be unveiled in October.

Unimpressed unions: “The speech painted a rosy picture of economic recovery and was too light on proposals for social justice,” said Luca Visentini, general secretary of the European Trade Union Confederation, adding that lack of a mention of potential job losses related to digitalization was “alarming and dangerous.”

Happy businesses: “We fully agree with President Juncker that Europe must sail the wind of economic improvements to take the necessary steps to further strengthen the European Union,” said BusinessEurope’s Emma Marcegaglia, pointing to “renewed attention to an EU industrial strategy.”

AT LAST! TRANSPARENCY REPORT ADOPTED: After two years of negotiations, MEPs on Thursday voted in favor of a report on transparency, accountability and integrity in the EU institutions by German Green Sven Giegold (by 368 to 161, with 60 abstentions). The report, which is non-binding, calls for documents to be published throughout the legislative process so lobbying can be monitored. It also wants a mandatory register for lobbyists and stakeholders wanting to shape legislation. However, MEPs weren’t keen on all of Giegold’s proposals, including the automatic disclosure of meetings between lawmakers and lobbyists, and tougher revolving door rules for European commissioners than those proposed this week by Juncker.

NGO smoke screen: Lawmakers from the European People’s Party refused to back the report because other MEPs hadn’t supported their amendments calling for a code of conduct for NGOs and for organizations to be eligible for funding “only if they argue by means of verifiable facts” and for restrictions on funding to groups which “demonstrably disseminate untruths.” NGOs criticized the move. “It is regrettable for a mainstream political grouping to be attacking civil society organizations at a time when [they] are under attack in Hungary, Poland and other EU member states,” said Johannes Trimmel, president of Concord, a coalition of development NGOs.

Inconsistency: The EPP’s amendments were based on those suggested by the group’s Markus Pieper in a separate report on NGO financing, which was put on ice shortly after being praised by Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orbán, who has launched his own crackdown on NGO funding. Speaking before this week’s vote, Civil Society Europe’s Carlotta Besozzi described it as “surprising” that the EPP had accepted the postponement of Pieper’s report (while the European Court of Auditors looks into EU funding of NGOs) “but had decided to put forward “very similar amendments” to Giegold’s report. Pieter De Pous, EU policy director at the European Environmental Bureau, went further, criticizing the hypocrisy of making “another cynical attempt to imply guilt without providing evidence” while opposing “improved transparency in trade negotiations and better protection of whistleblowers.”

Purveyors of fake news: “We should not fund organizations that fight Europe and its values, neither people who circulate fake news,” Pieper told Brussels Influence. “Do [the Greens] want to be responsible for giving taxpayers’ money to organizations that are initiating hate campaigns or denying crimes against humanity or questioning the scientifically valid results of climate change?”

A smokescreen? Giegold told Brussels Influence that the EPP’s move was “a PR stunt” and their suggestions were “a smokescreen.” He added that at no point in the past two years of discussions on his plans had the EPP mentioned the proposals it put forward.

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INFLUENTIAL CLIMATE LOBBYISTS: Koch Industries, the Southern Company and ExxonMobil are the companies that are the most active and influential in opposing climate friendly policies, according to a new report by InfluenceMap, which analyzed lobbying activity on climate policy. On the opposite side, Apple, Unilever and Ikea were deemed the most instrumental in pushing for policies aligned with the Paris agreement, the report found.

BELL POTTINGER FALLOUT: Controversial PR firm Bell Pottinger went into administration Tuesday after a mass exodus of clients in the wake of a scandal over its campaign to stir up racial tensions in South Africa. Consultants in Brussels have been quick to point out that not all PR firms are cut from the same cloth. “Reputations take years to build and seconds to destroy,” said Mónica Vicente Cristina, a managing director at Weber Shandwick.

Code of conduct: Most Brussels consultancies are signed up to the European Public Affairs Consultancies’ Association’s code of conduct, which obliges them not to do anything as unpleasant as bribe EU officials or sell institutional documents for profit as well as the less odious task (we hope) of signing up to the EU’s transparency register. For Karl Isaksson, managing partner at Kreab and EPACA’s chairman, self-regulation “can be very efficient … the reputational cost of being expelled by one’s trade association is huge.”

Internal procedures: Some firms have strict processes that ensure any client work is properly checked before being undertaken. “This is obviously a complex topic for the whole industry, but we do need to be firm on where the lines are drawn,” said James Stevens, FleishmanHillard EU’s managing director, who added that “any client work that may be considered potentially controversial” can be referred “up the company all the way to our global HQ.” For others, such as Cambre Associates, there’s a blanket ban on working with clients “linked to discrimination of any kind” or with sectors that are “identified as being negative from a societal point of view,” according to the firm’s CEO Tom Parker.

Active involvement: Séamus Conboy, director of campaigns and EU affairs at Red Flag, said all of his firm’s campaigns “are senior-led — so senior management are actively involved and know what’s going on day-to-day.” APCO Worldwide has a Responsible Business Committee, which ensures the enforcement of its code of conduct and “serves as a resource for employees who have questions, concerns or personal conflicts with the assignments we accept or how we operate,” according to Claire Boussagol, the firm’s Europe boss.

COALITION OF THE WEEK: Trade associations such as DigitalEurope, Bitkom and TechUK set aside their differences with NGOs like the European Digital Rights Initiative to pressure MEPs and government officials to look again at a proposal to require online companies to “employ content recognition software to implement ex-ante blocking measures filtering all user uploads and posts.” Read it here.